My name is James, but you can call me Chippy.

I've discovered myself through the use of AI generative art tools.

This is who I am, who we are.

I was fired from my job in the middle of 2022.

It was a devastating experience and inspired one of several mental health crises I’ve experienced in my lifetime. I would never credit that experience with my discovering myself, but I have learned a lot since then.

And I know I can never go back to places like the one I worked at again.

Riddled with burnt out humans, ineffective leadership hierarchies, and people at the top who continue to benefit massively from the people at the bottom—and yet the disparity in how people get paid remains immeasurable.

IMHO: No one should get an annual bonus of $50,000 if the people at the bottom of the pyramid make less than $50,000 annually.

Soapboxes aside, I had to break free from that negativity. It was all-consuming, the hurt, the confusion, the pain.

I’ve filed a complaint with the EEOC and I’ll be pursuing my rights legally when I can, but I needed to heal. I needed to figure out what my life was going to look like after a decade of work in higher education and the non-profit sector.

And in my introspection, I’ve come to embrace my neurodivergent brain.

I think different.

My brain doesn’t really operate like typical people.

My earliest memories of social interactions are riddled with anxious confusion. I spent years of my life trying to understand how to fit in, how to adapt to this world, how to connect with others.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve crashed because I stay focused on how many times I’ve emerged from the ashes.

Enter Midjourney.

I discovered Midjourney shortly before my professional life blew up. The months that followed my discovery were filled with creation.

I’ve always had 1,001 stories in my head, and when I started realizing them through Midjourney, I felt free. I was also severely depressed, so we might call that period of time my blue period. Heh.

Then I started messing around on Instagram and I discovered one of the best communities on Earth.

The AI Art Community.

There’s a lot of loud opinions about AI art, we won’t be talking about those here too much—because the voices I want to amplify are voices like mine—the hundreds of thousands of people who have:

1. Uncovered their latent powers of creation and storytelling

2. Discovered the healing power of creativity

3. Embraced a community of amazing humans trying their best for, and with, one another

These are the people I’ve discovered in the AI art community, and I know I’m just scratching the surface.

There are stories to be told.

I spent December engaging in artist collaborations with other AI artists, traditional artists, and real life humans when I had the gusto to introduce myself.

I discovered something really beautiful. Storytelling on a global scale.

I’ve connected with people from around the world who all have stories to share—and for the first time in a really long time, I didn’t feel alone in my thoughts or experiences. So, that’s what you’re going to get when you subscribe to this.

Free Subscribers get a constant flow of stories from the humans behind AI art. When we tap that supply dry, we’re going to be connecting with the humans using other artificial intelligence tools.

Paid Subscribers get stories of a different kind. Are y’all bored yet with Netflix cancelling your favorite stuff and rehashing vampire stories? I know I sure am. And I’ve discovered a whole world of beautiful story tellers.

You don’t need to subscribe, of course, you can find all of these great storytellers on your own.

• We’ll aggregate storytelling here so you can share in the joy

• We’ll connect with the storytellers to develop original content for subscribers

• We’ll develop our own original storytelling for you to enjoy

That’s pretty much it. I have a lot of grand plans for how this evolves, but I don’t want to make empty promises and get overwhelmed with the infinite possibilities.

TL;DR:

• Stories about the humans behind the AI art

• Humans developing stories alongside their AI art

• Joy

Thanks for coming along.

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